Titian’s famous resurrection painting depicts the encounter between Jesus and Mary Magdalene shortly after dawn on the first Easter day when Jesus had risen from the garden tomb provided by Joseph of Arimathea. When Mary found the tomb empty, she became distressed thinking that the body had been stolen. Unexpectedly, a man appeared before her and through her tears she presumed he was Joseph’s gardener. However, when he greeted her by name, she recognised him immediately and reached out to touch him. Jesus responded by saying ‘Do not touch me (or do not cling to me) for I have not yet ascended to the Father. Go instead to my brothers and tell them, I am ascending to my Father and your Father, to my God and your God. (John 20:17)
It’s noteworthy that Christ reserves his first resurrection appearance for Mary, the prostitute and sinner. It’s also significant that she was the first ‘missionary’ to announce to the world that Jesus had risen from the dead. The love and forgiveness that had transformed her must now be transformed once more as Jesus was soon to return to his Father. She and the other disciples must now learn to love him spiritually as God, rather than the man they had followed these past three years.
Titian captures the dynamic of the exchange in our Lord’s graceful pulling away and Mary’s reaching out and yearning. Renaissance artists welcomed the opportunity to depict Jesus lightly clad in their desire to show their prowess in painting the male nude. The expression ‘Don’t touch me’ has a topical ring in a world and Church where the importance of safeguarding has never been higher. The painting highlights in the same moment; the vulnerability of Jesus, naked and wounded by the nails, and the divinity of Jesus having been raised from the dead. With Mary Magdalene we kneel and worship our God who came to earth to live and inspire; to suffer and to die, and to be raised to life – the same life which all his followers can share today.
David Hawkins
